Who owns the money? Hundreds of thousands of ordinary Victorians. But currently it is in the custody of state and federal authorities. More than 640,000 superannuation accounts - worth an estimated $1 billion also rest alongside because its owners cannot be traced. A $769,000 division one Tattslotto prize from a ticket purchased 8 years ago is also amongst unclaimed Tatts winnings totaling $180 million.

Another absent-minded person or maybe deceased person left $287,000 sitting in a Victorian ANZ bank account. The TAB has handed more than $51 million in unclaimed winnings to State Trustees since 1997, including $10 million last financial year.

Rowan Martin from TAB explains that bets usually placed during the spring carnival and generally they are a small punter betting a small amount of money forgetting about the ticket.

On the national scale over $7.3 billion lies unclaimed in 4.6 million superannuation accounts held in trust by the Australian Tax Office (AT0). Few accounts each contain more than $1 million; more than 135,000 accounts have balances of more than $10,000, and 1.9 million are worth less than $200.